


to fly or to fall

by landocalrissian



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/F, Femslash, Fix-It
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-18
Updated: 2017-08-18
Packaged: 2018-12-16 19:31:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11835516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/landocalrissian/pseuds/landocalrissian
Summary: When Rey finds a broken down ship in the desert and Devi offers to help her fix it Rey get's a lot more than she bargained for. This follows Devi and Rey's relationship during and after star wars novel Before the Awakening (Devi was Rey's first girlfriend).





	to fly or to fall

**Author's Note:**

> Happy femslash week! This is for day 5: fix it! I hope you enjoy <3

Rey shouldn't have been out past dark. There were swarms of gnaw jaws, sand storms, and unnamed creatures of the night to worry about, but her racing mind promised her that nothing was more dangerous than leaving the Ghtroc 690 alone one more night. Not like anything had happened to it so far, but after the test flight yesterday her paranoia was enough to get her out of bed in the middle of the night, sure she would arrive to nothing but more darkness where its metal figure should have been. 

It flew.  
  
It soared.  
  
When Rey held the controls it felt like it was a part of her, an extension of her body made to dance at her will. With Devi whooping with joy in the co-pilot seat (and a contrasting Strunk whose knuckles paled with fear as he gripped the back of her chair), Rey felt lighter than she ever had, pride a strange new emotion which warmed her chest and made her cheeks burn with a smile she couldn't will away if she tried. She reluctantly brought the the Ghtroc back down so that no one would spot it, her ship, her pride, her joy. When Devi pulled her into an enthusiastic hug Rey felt as though she had never landed at all.  
  
  
As much as she didn't completely trust Devi and Strunk, Rey's chest felt more and more hollow when she thought about parting ways with the only people she had ever almost, maybe, possibly considered to be her friends.  
  
Especially Devi.  
  
Devi, with her smile that radiated like the sun and filled Rey with just as much warmth. Devi, who laughed like a thunder clap from the X'us' R'iia, loud and carefree in a way Rey envied. Devi, with her warm calloused hands from years of scavenging, openly used with such affection, pulling her into one armed hugs, slapping her shoulder light and teasing, and pulling Rey by her own weathered hand when she got excited. Rey already dreads the silence that would follow her departure, her constant chatter now as familiar as the wind which sings between the cracks of her walker each night, a chatter Rey feels replaced with emptiness when Devi departs with a hug and a wave each day.  
  
Rey is lucky that the sky that night is clear, stars illuminating the sandy terrain in tones of gray. Spotting the Ghtroc gleaming slightly in the dim light she rides to a stop. Rey knows that her worries were unfounded, but still feels a calming wave of relief.  
  
Now that she is here she isn’t sure what to do. It’s too early to get to work fixing the ship but too late and dangerous to go back home for the rest of the night. 

Rey slips through the empty window pane into the cockpit to try and find a comfortable place to rest her eyes for a few hours. She was struck once again, as she was the first time she entered at night, by the stillness, the silence of the ship. A ghost ship which she had brought back to life.  
  
Silence.  
  
Then a thud as something lands in the sand behind her.  
  
Rey swivels instinctively, striking out with her staff and sending her attacker to their knees with a single blow. The figure lets out a surprised grunt.  
  
“Hey hey HEY, chill with the cane would you? It’s me!”  
  
“…Devi?” With her eyes adjusting to the dark Rey was able to make out the annoyed face of her friend.  
  
Rey wonders when she had started calling her that. She offers a hand which Devi accepts with a grateful smile. At her full height, Devi still stood a head shorter than Rey. That didn’t mean that Rey underestimated her as an opponent. She was quick on her feet and more intelligent than Rey first took her to be, taking the lead over Strunk whenever it came to making decisions. And she was strong. Shoulders broad and muscular, arms well formed through years of dragging and lifting heavy scraps, and powerful, athletic legs.  
  
Rey blushes, realizing she’s staring and quickly lets go of Devi’s hand.  
  
“Who else would it be?” Devi looks down, wiping the sand off her legs. When she looks back up she’s smiling as though smiling is the easiest thing in the world. “You’re early! Or should I say late? It’s the middle of the night, what are you doing here?”  
  
“I could ask you the same thing, Devi, it’s just as late for you.” Rey’s heart is in her throat, beating faster at this unexpected encounter.  
  
She was guarding the ship, Devi explains. For the past two weeks her and Strunk had been taking turns sleeping inside and keeping watch.  
  
“You woke me up!”  
  
Rey apologizes, rubbing her hand up and down her arm. There is an awkward, tension filled moment, which as always, was quickly swallowed by Devi’s voice.  
  
“Well, there is no way I’m getting back to sleep now. The sky is really clear tonight.” Devi gestures outside. “Want to join me?”  
  
Rey smiles softly. “I’d like that.”  
  
Devi disappears into the ship, returning with a blanket. She exits through the empty window, taking hold of Rey’s hand to help her up to the roof. Rey thinks to complain but the words are lost in her throat at the gentleness of Devi’s touch. Devi lets go and spreads the blanket carefully on the sand. She sits down, patting the spot beside her in invitation. Rey settles beside her, trying to leave some space but still aware of how close they are.  
  
Looking up, Rey almost gasps. The stars are brilliant. They reach across the sky like a brush stroke, twinkling with life, frozen in movement, disappearing over the horizon in every direction.  
  
They stare in wonder and silence, both dumbstruck by the sight.  
  
Not that the silence lasts more than a minute. 

Devi talks about the progress they've made on the ship and her plans for the coming days. Devi asks Rey how she learned to fly ships and Rey finds she is nearly as good of a listener as she is a talker, gasping with excitement when Rey tells her about the simulation flight machine she found and laughing with delight when Rey offers to show it to her.  
  
Rey finds herself smiling and is baffled by how natural it feels when Devi is there, talking animatedly with so much brightness and so much hope.  
  
Devi’s eyes turn to the stars and she talks about her dreams, the places she wants to visit, how each star is a possibility. A future where she doesn’t worry about where her next meal will come from, where she won't have to ration her water and watch for thieves. A place where she can build a home. A hope.  
  
Then Devi gets quiet.  
  
“I wish you’d come with me. You’d be really great to have around. I mean, we’re partners in crime now!” Devi says, elbowing Rey playfully. “I know you said you wanted to sell the ship, but just think about it. You would never have to see Unkar’s ugly face again, and you could fly a real ship! Our ship!”  
  
Rey smiles at the thought. It fades until she looks away, unable to look Devi in the eye and see all that hope that lay there.  
  
“I can’t. I can’t leave,” she says, quiet so the words don’t hurt as much. She feels them tearing at her throat, aching in her lungs, but they are the truth. Devi isn’t discouraged.  
  
“What could you possibly have to stay for? Name one thing that Jakku has that doesn’t make you want to run as far as you can. A single thing that you can’t find somewhere else.”  
  
Rey can’t. But it isn’t as simple as that for her. She thinks of memories so old she isn’t even sure they are real, kind faces and warm hands and love, love, love. The thought of them coming back for her to find she had left them, given up after all these years, makes her chest tighten. Rey can’t breathe. She can’t breathe. She can’t.  
  
“I can’t. I just can’t. I’m sorry.”  
  
Devi pauses for a minute. “Can you at least tell me why?”  
  
Rey opens her mouth, wanting to explain, trying, but coming up with nothing. She shakes her head.  
  
Devi is silent. The silence fills Rey, slipping into her ears and filling her brain with a loud ringing and turning her chest into a vacuum. Rey feels too much. She feels nothing.  
  
When Devi finally speaks, she’s quiet, a quiet which gives importance to her usually boisterous words. She is soft and more unsure than Rey had ever seen her.  
  
“I just… I have never felt this close to someone before. I’ve never had anyone, really. Strunk is, well... he’s Strunk.” Devi finally looks into Rey’s eyes. “I’ll stay for you, if you want. Until you’re ready to leave. You’re going to have to realize one day there is nothing here for us.”  
  
Rey’s heart is in her throat, filled with longing and hope and so much grief. She wants to say yes, she wants to trust Devi, she wants to believe that Devi wouldn’t leave one day without a word, that she doesn’t have some other motive for saying all these things. She wants Devi to stay.  
  
“I can’t ask you to do that.” Rey can’t meet her gaze, but she feels it on her, searching for something, though Rey couldn’t imagine what. Devi is silent for a moment, just searching.  
  
“Still, I just… I can’t leave without knowing,” Devi says.  
  
“Knowing what?” Rey asks, looking up at Devi in confusion.  
  
Devi looks nervous for the first time since Rey met her, rubbing her neck with her hand and looking at the ground. “Knowing whether there is something here… with us. between us... you know. You and me. Something.”  
  
Rey stares with a blank face, waiting for Devi to reach her point.  
  
“...You know?” Devi finishes looking up.The sun is a golden sliver on the horizon, radiating just enough light for Rey to notice Devi’s cheeks turning a light shade of pink.  
  
“Oh kriff, you don’t know, do you. Well… blast it.”  
  
Then Devi is leaning in, her lips reaching Rey’s before she can overthink it. The kiss is gentle and warm and surprisingly shy. It’s over before Rey is able to process that it had begun. Devi pulls back, her hand warm where it covers Rey’s own. Seeing Rey’s blank face unchanged, Devi removes it, rubbing the back of her neck and looking anywhere but Rey.  
  
“I’m...it’s okay, I mean I shouldn’t have- I’m sorry, I didn’t mean-”  
  
Rey pulls them together once again, hands wrapping around Devi’s neck to deepen the kiss. Devi takes a moment to respond, but when she does it’s with all the enthusiasm that Rey loves her for. It’s enthusiastic and deep and so terrifyingly honest, even though some part of Rey tells her there must be another reason. Something Devi can take from this and use against her. Rey tries to press all her hopes and fears into her lips, to tease the truth out of her mouth, to tell Devi how grateful she is to have her around, to have her to fill the silence in her life, to finally have someone, someone who would stay for her. For her. For Rey.  
  
When they break apart they spend a few moments foreheads together, sharing breaths. Devi’s face breaks into a smile as bright as the golden light which frames her figure. With Devi’s hand in her own, Rey feels it reflected on her open face, and her cheeks burn with the unfamiliar sensation. She’ll leave you. She’ll leave like the rest of them. You’ll wake up and you’ll have nothing. You aren’t enough for her. You aren’t enough.  
  
Rey ignores the voice in the back of her head for now, settling for holding Devi in her arms and watching the sun rise. She’ll deal with it later.  
  
\----------  
  
Strunk arrives some hours later to find Devi fast asleep with her head on Rey’s chest, arms wrapped around each other and legs tangled together. He raises his eyebrows questioningly but doesn’t say anything.  
  
With that the business day begins, Rey taking charge to remind them what needs to be done. Devi offers to go check out the Lambda-Class shuttle and tells Rey she has to come with her, insisting that nooks and crannies are too small for Strunk to fit. Strunk just shrugs his shoulders and goes inside the Ghtroc to see what he can tidy up and fix while they are away. Devi kisses Rey’s cheek quickly and skips away, leaving Rey with a silly grin on her face in the dust to catch up. She wonders when she had ever felt so light in her whole life.  
  
She’ll leave you.  
  
Rey shakes her head to get rid of her thoughts and chases after Devi.  
  
\--------------  
  
Three days later, Rey flew the Ghtroc 690 into Niima outpost, Devi beaming in the co-pilot's seat and Strunk looking increasingly anxious the closer they got, one large hand on the back of each of their chairs. Nearly a year of hard work, of going hungry to save parts for the ship, and it was flying. Fully operational hyperdrive and repulsor engines, pressure seals tight, and atmosphere stable. Rey made a show out of it, making a few rounds of the outpost. Her cheeks ached with a smile as she saw a bustle of activity below, scavengers and venders stepping out from under their shelters to gaze up in awe at her. At her ship.  
  
“Think they’ve seen enough?” Rey asks.  
  
“I think they’ve never seen anything like this,” Devi says.  
  
Not ready to land just yet, Rey pulled on the controls, bringing the Ghtroc into a loop. Devi whooped. Strunk’s knuckles whitened on their seats.  
  
With that, Rey lowered it into the airfield, hovering as she turned it in place. She brought it down so lightly that it barely seemed they had landed at all.  
  
Rey works the console quickly, unable to hold in her excitement as she puts the ship into standby. She hits the release for the ramp and as it lowers she can see the crowd that has begun to gather at the edge of the airfield, trying to catch a glimpse of the newcomers.  
  
“Don’t let anyone else aboard,” Rey tells Devi. “Only me and Unkar, nobody else, no matter how hard they beg.”  
  
“Ten thousand portions, minimum,” Devi says.  
  
“For all of us,” Rey adds with a grin, swinging a leg over her speeder and starting up the engines. It shoots down the ramp, past the crowd who break into cheers as they see her, to Unkar’s place.  
  
Unkar is waiting outside as she pulls up blinking with what Rey thinks is shock. She hops down from her speeder and walks up to him with the confidence of knowing she has the upper hand this time. He would give her what she wanted, anything she wanted, and her life would change forever.  
  
“It’s a Ghtroc 690. Fully restored, working hyperdrive, everything but the laser cannon and the water tanks. Everything else fully operational, Unkar.”  
  
That’s when Rey hears it. The rumble of an engine starting. Unkar’s head turns towards the airfield and he grunts and heads back inside.  
  
Rey turns to look, dread coiling in her stomach. She sees the Ghtroc lift off the ground. She watches as it’s nose jerks up, taking to the air with all the grace Rey repaired it to have. She watches as the main engines ignite in flash of blue. She watches it gets smaller and smaller, as it speeds away. She watches as it becomes a dot in the blue sky. She watches as it disappears.  
  
Then she stands there for a long moment, watching the nothingness. The crowd disperses as everyone goes back about their business. The show was over.  
  
Rey looks down and sighs, cursing herself for hoping for any better. She hops on her speeder and heads back to her walker.

She doesn’t feel angry. She feels nothing.  
  
\---------  
  
Everytime she returns to Niima outpost she definitely doesn’t look to the airfield and feel something in her stomach, something almost like hope. And if she does, she doesn’t let herself think about it.  
  
\----------  
  
When she flies away with Finn and says she has to return to Jakku, it’s only because of the chance her parents might return for her, not that someone else might too.  
  
\-----------  
  
If she finds her eyes searching the crowds on the resistance base, it isn’t because she hopes to see a bright smile and a slight lean figure running over to jump into her arms.  
  
\-----------  
  
When Finn comes back for her on Starkiller, she feels a part of herself becomes whole. When they hold each other, in the middle of such chaos and evil, she has never felt so complete.  
  
“What’d he say?”  
  
“That it was your idea.” He came back. He came back for her. He came back.  
  
\----------  
  
By the time Rey is training with Luke Skywalker, the myth, the legend, the Luke Skywalker, Devi is a distant memory. And if late at night her mind turns to memories of lingering hands and soft lips, of sunshine and warmth and hope, she barely remembers in the morning.  
  
\---------  
  
So by the time her ship arrives back to the resistance base, and she’s a jedi, and Luke, Luke Skywalker, is trailing behind her, she searches the platform for the face of someone she expects.  
  
Someone who came back.  
  
The crowd bursts into cheers as they exit and Rey smiles nervously, not sure what to do with all the attention. Leia makes her way through the throng and gives the crowd a stern, but forgiving look as she orders them all to give the newcomers some space. There are a few more scattered cheers, but for the most part the swarm leaves to continue about their days. Leia smiles, her brown eyes gentle as she meets Rey and Luke on the platform.  
  
“This wasn’t supposed to be a big event, but you know how word gets around.” She pulls Rey into a hug. “It’s good to have you back.”  
  
“It’s good to be back.” Leia nods in response, but her attention is already gone. Rey understands and gives the Skywalker’s some space to reconnect. She knows all about waiting.  
  
As she looks up she sees, out of the few remaining people, Finn. Her unsure smile brightens until she can’t hold it in anymore any they are running and she is holding her friend in her arms, and he’s alive, he’s safe.  
  
“Finn! You look good!”  
  
“Rey! Thank the stars you’re back. You have to tell me everything. And I mean everything. Every tiny little detail. What was the weather like? How cool is Luke Skywalker? Do you know how to fly now?”  
  
Rey laughs, relieved to see her friend just as bright as usual. Last time she’d seen him… she didn’t like to think of that.  
  
“A little chilly, very, and no. But we should go somewhere more comfortable, I want to hear all about your adventures as well!” Rey says.  
  
“Yes! But wait- I nearly forgot, there is someone here from Jakku, she’s been here for the past few weeks, she says she knows you, I tried to-.”  
  
The rest of what Finn says goes right over her head. She looked over his shoulder and could swear she sees a ghost.  
  
It was her. Same hair shaved on the sides, though now in standard resistance jacket and pants. She also carries an unfamiliar air of uncertainty, as though finally standing in front of Rey she wasn’t sure what to do.  
  
“Finn, just give me a second.” Rey says, patting Finn on the shoulder and giving him a smile as she stepped away, towards the ghost, the vision she saw which couldn’t possibly be real. Rey moved towards Devi as though cautiously approaching a thissermount, scared she might disappear if she went too quickly.  
  
Devi wasn’t having it. Her face broke into a huge grin, and she ran over.  
  
“Come here, you!” Devi laughs, pulling Rey into strong, familiar arms. She holds her there for a few seconds, a minute, an hour, Rey couldn’t tell. Time didn’t matter when her whole world was spinning so fast, a dream, this couldn’t possibly be real.  
  
“How is this- Why- What are you doing here?” Rey says once she pulls away.  
  
“Listen, I know you must have a lot of questions. First off, I want you to know I’m so sorry. I’m so, so, sorry Rey. And I understand if you can’t forgive me.” Rey nods, encouraging Devi to continue.  
  
“But I need you to understand it wasn’t my fault. Strunk- that good for nothing, lying, cheating scoundrel pulled a kriffing blaster on me the minute you left the ship. I should have fought him, I should have, but it all happened so fast.”  
  
“He did what?”Rey says, her world spinning and spinning, upside down and back around with each word Devi says.  
  
“He wanted to leave, I knew how to pilot it. I escaped from him as soon as we landed for fuel. He’d gone mad, would do anything to leave Jakku. Like, he really didn’t want to sell the thing.  
I found passage back to Jakku as soon as I could, I swear, but you were gone. I’m sorry Rey, I never should have trusted him.”  
  
Rey shook her head. “No. I never should have left you two alone on the ship. This is on me.” Rey shakes her head again, still unable to believe what was happening. “How did you find me?”  
  
“Well, people talk. It wasn’t difficult to find out what had happened on Jakku and that you were caught up in it somehow. You! Just a scavenger from Jakku! Caught up in all this.” Devi shook her head, gesturing around them. “It’s crazy. Anyway, I assumed if you were in trouble with the first order, chances are you’d end up with the Resistance. Eventually I found myself here and met your buddy Finn who told me you would be back soon, so I decided to make myself useful while I waited.” Devi’s smile somehow became even more radiant and she slapped Rey on the shoulder. “Look at us! Resistance fighters, fighting the good fight. And you! A jedi! If you told me a few years ago that future-me would be here, I would have told you to kiss a happabore.”  
  
“What if I had told you you could be kissing something cuter than a happabore?” Rey can hardly believe what she just said, wasn’t even sure if it made sense in the context, but she was so delirious from the long flight and shocked to the core with what was happening that she didn’t really care.  
  
“Like, maybe, a jedi?” Devi says, quirking an eyebrow.  
  
“Maybe.” Rey says, her cheeks growing hot. Devi’s smile became soft, and she ran both her hands up Rey’s arms and reached them around her neck, sending a pleasant chill down Rey’s spine. Devi’s face was so close that Rey could feel her breathe on her cheek, that their noses almost brushed, that Rey could hardly breathe.  
  
“I’d have told you I couldn’t wait.”


End file.
